Why the 49ers Will Beat the Rams to Advance to the Super Bowl
It isn't easy to defeat an opponent three times in the same season.
But that is exactly what the San Francisco 49ers are going to do when they square off with the Los Angeles Rams in the NFC Championship game.
The laws of probability may not agree here just because the Rams are "due" for a win. Luckily, there is an actual game to be played here for the 49ers. And in that game, "probability" cannot account for physicality. It is unquantifiable. This is the nature of the sport and what makes the 49ers so threatening. Their aggressive nature is what opposing teams struggle to match.
And it is why the 49ers will beat the Rams to advance to the Super Bowl.
This could be the fourth or fifth time the 49ers would be playing the Rams this season. I still would side with the 49ers because they have something the Rams do not -- aggressiveness.
It is not a coincidence that the Niners have owned the Rams in the last three seasons. They get physical with them and the Rams tap out. Look no further than Week 18 on a drive in the third quarter when the 49ers ran the ball every single time and the Rams had no answer. That drive alone outright spoke aloud about how the 49ers viewed the Rams as a soft team.
“That's just how you do things," said Kyle Shanahan on being physical. "You don't try to turn it up or turn it down, it's just how you play football. I don't think you should pick and choose when to be physical in football. You get more than five fouls or six, I guess in the NBA. But you want guys to play the game right. And I think it starts with practice in that way, which is a very fine line.
"You can't do that all the time and keep guys healthy. That's why it's a tough sport to practice. It's a tough sport to do year-round, but that is what the sport is. It's the physicality, it's about running, it's about hitting, it's about blocking, it's about tackling and you have to train guys to do that. And then you just cut them loose in the game.”
The Rams spotted them 17 points against the 49ers in Week 18 and STILL blew the game. This team cannot handle the 49ers for four quarters because their physicality ends up exposing them. Los Angeles can only handle so much of it before they start tapping out. Expect the same to happen this time with a flurry of attacks from Elijah Mitchell and Deebo Samuel.
The only chance the Rams have in this game is if Matthew Stafford has the game of his life, for which I wouldn't hold my breath. The 49ers defense has been stout all season long and I sincerely doubt that they are going to allow Stafford to have an elite game. They just confused and suffocated Aaron Rodgers last weekend on the road in harsh conditions. Stafford doing much better than Rodgers would be a shock, but it is what they are going to need to defeat the 49ers.
Other than that, this game is for the Niners' taking to return to the Super Bowl.
